Families in Austin looking for a fun, kid-friendly way to spend an afternoon are in luck. Earlier this year, entrepreneur Reva Enzminger opened the first hologram zoo in America there, called Zoocade. Using hologram technology that TIME Magazine named one of the “Best Inventions of 2023," Zoocade lets customers interact with lifelike visions of animals and explore themed adventure rooms. As an added bonus, there’s also a more traditional arcade included.
For customers, the hologram zoo is a novel activity that kids and adults can enjoy together. But behind the scenes, Reva faces the challenges every small business owner does—from a budget that makes hiring enough employees difficult, to handling all the marketing herself, to doing it all while also tackling the demanding job of being a mom. And with six employees total, the company falls into one of the most difficult business categories for providing health insurance: those with under 10 employees.
Providing health care is hard, but important
Reva has experience running a business, having previously owned seven Edible Arrangements locations. As such, she was no stranger to the process of trying to provide health care benefits to employees. Her feelings about it?
“I find it painful, literally,” she says. “[That’s] the number one word that comes to my mind.”
One of the worst parts was the incredible amount of time it would take to research what policies are out there. And when she’d try working with brokers to make the process easier, she was never really sure if they were providing the best options. Complicating things further, her employees had different levels of need. She could never see a way to offer each employee the kind of plan that would best meet their needs, while sticking to any kind of feasible budget.
And even if she found a plan that worked for everyone one year, she’d inevitably have to start the whole process over again the next year. It’s a game she just couldn’t win.
But Reva really wanted to provide health benefits. She knew it was important for attracting employees—people are more likely to apply and stick around if they have health insurance. She also recognized that people miss less work when they can get to the doctor regularly, before any issues become emergencies. That’s good for keeping the business running smoothly.
None of that is as important as the main reason though. “If you care about your employees, you want them to be healthy,” she says. Plain and simple.
An early, imperfect attempt at a solution
The process of signing up for small business health insurance plans was so daunting, that back in her Edible Arrangements days, Reva gave up on providing health insurance. But because she still cared about her employees, she often ended up paying for their doctor’s visits out of pocket. It was a small way she could help them still get care, but it was an inadequate solution.
For one thing, she could only help out with run-of-the-mill sicknesses. Giving employees a couple hundred dollars for a doctor’s appointment and antibiotics was one thing, but if someone broke their leg? That went beyond what was practical for her to spend. And this approach didn’t help with access to preventative care. On the whole, it wasn’t an option that served employees well long term.
An actual solution: StretchDollar
With Zoocade, she finally found a better solution. StretchDollar solved many of the problems she had with small business health insurance plans.
- You can create a set budget.
“My favorite thing [about StretchDollar] is I can pick my very specific budget of how much I'm going to spend on health care for the employees,” says Reva. Small business budgeting is a constant challenge, and surprises are never a good thing. StretchDollar allows you to set a predictable budget for health benefits that you can keep consistent from one year to the next.
- It saves a lot of time and work.
Another big difference StretchDollar makes is the time and effort involved in getting signed up for a plan. “It just takes all of the stress of digging and researching and finding the plans and making sure that I've got everybody covered,” Reva explains. You can simply set the budget, and let your employees take it from there. And StretchDollar provides your employees guidance to make the process easy on them too, so you’re not just offloading the work onto them.
- Every employee can choose the right plan for them.
Finally, taking advantage of ICHRA (Individual Coverage Health Reimbursement Arrangement) takes care of the problem of employees having different needs by giving them choice in the process. You don’t have to worry that going with the more affordable option means some employees miss out on health care they need.
“They know they can pick the perfect [plan] for themselves,” Reva says. Everyone wins.
Getting started is a breeze
All of these benefits would probably be worth it even if getting started was an involved process. But with StretchDollar, getting signed up only takes a matter of minutes—not the weeks or months typical with small group plans.
“My gosh, it was amazing,” Reva says of her experience. “I went online. I think I was set up in 10 minutes.”
She was able to get her first employee set up right away, knew the money would come straight out of her checking account, and that’s it. Her part was done. She knew her employee was taken care of, and she didn’t have to think about it further. For a small business owner, moving something stressful off your plate is one of the biggest gifts you can get (maybe even better than an edible arrangement😉).
StretchDollar can give you that gift too. If you’re ready to ditch brokers and small group plans, while still setting your employees up with health care access, get started today.
